Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for External Territories) Share this | Hansard source

I am very pleased to participate in this debate around the Land Transport Infrastructure Amendment Bill 2014. I come to this dispatch box as someone who has observed and experienced the vicissitudes of various governments over a long time in this place. One of the most significant experiences I can recall was, from my perspective, not a happy one—when the Keating government was defeated in 1996. Sadly, for me, I lost my job. I did return, as you have yourself, Mr Deputy Speaker Broadbent. An important measure of the Keating government prior to that time was the introduction of a strategic roads program for the Northern Territory. This strategic roads program was about looking at road infrastructure across remote parts of the Northern Territory and coming to an agreement with the then Northern Territory government, road transport users and local Aboriginal organisations and communities about the strategic priorities for roads. A sum of money was made available—I forget the sum, but it was $15 million or $20 million—for this program. It was not a lot of money, but it did make a difference.

So you can imagine how sad I was, in addition to the fact that I lost my seat, to see that one of the first acts of the then Howard government was to axe that program. I say that because what it demonstrated to me was a clear lack of understanding of the importance of road infrastructure for remote Australia. Anyone who comes to regional and remote Australia, but particularly remote Australia, would understand the need to have good road infrastructure.

In my electorate of Lingiari, we are talking about an electorate of 1.3 million square kilometres, or one-sixth of the Australian landmass. It covers all of the Northern Territory, except for Darwin and Palmerston. It also includes, incidentally, for interest's sake, the Christmas and Cocos islands, which are, of course, not served by road—or they cannot be accessed by road. I was consumed by why the then Howard government should take this course of action. I understand the need and importance of safety on Highway 1 et cetera, but the people who most needed road infrastructure improvements in this country—people whose lives depended upon access by road to remote communities—were being forgotten. As a direct result of decisions taken by the Howard government, they were put to the bottom of the pile.

Subsequently, of course, we know the Howard government lasted for a number of years. Then, in 2007, we saw the election of the Rudd Labor government. What was significant about the period between 2007 and 2013 was the difference that the Labor governments made over that period to expenditure on infrastructure, and road infrastructure in particular, across this great country of ours. If you compare the 2011-12 budget with the 2006-07 budget, there was an increase of over 250 per cent in that infrastructure expenditure—from $1.6 billion to $4.12 billion. Almost two-thirds of that expenditure went to non-urban projects. That is very significant because it highlighted an understanding by the Labor government of the need to invest in this infrastructure of such great importance to communities across Australia. When we talk about the sort of expenditure this represented, in the case of the Northern Territory infrastructure expenditure increased from $275 per head to $458 per head across five Labor budgets. That is a significant increase. Twenty eight million dollars went to the Territory local governments over that period just for the Roads to Recovery program alone.

If I mentioned these rivers, the Goyder and the Donydji, I would imagine that, apart from me, very few members in this chamber would even know whether they existed, let alone where they are, what communities might lie beyond them and why it is important to have road infrastructure—in this case, bridges—built over these rivers to allow access to communities. In many parts of northern Australia, communities are inaccessible by road for up to six months per year. That creates tremendous pressure and cost on those communities, so this sort of road infrastructure expenditure is vitally important, as is, of course, the normal obligation of the Commonwealth government to invest in highways, such as the Stuart Highway or the Arnhem Highway to Jabiru.

The investments made by government are vitally important in determining how communities can operate, and in the context of the Northern Territory that means not only for the liveability in communities but for the provision of fundamental goods and services that everyone in this chamber, including those in the gallery, would take for granted but which do not exist for many communities because of their location. They cannot get fresh fruit and vegetables on a regular basis because of their location and the lack of infrastructure or the poor nature of infrastructure that leads to these communities. So roads are vitally important. It is therefore important that we appreciate our obligation here in this parliament, representing the interests of all Australians, to make sure these investments are made and that they go to those people most in need. Sadly, though, it appears that most investments being made currently are being made on the basis of political priorities, not necessarily on the basis of need.

The more recent of the commitments that were made by Labor in government, before being defeated last year, understood the importance and centrality of roads to social and economic wellbeing and effective service delivery across communities. Our successive budgets demonstrated that very clearly. The infrastructure investments made by Labor in government included those announced on 3 August 2012, when the then minister, Mr Albanese, put out a press release announcing $90 million towards a new regional roads program in the Northern Territory, with a $16 million contribution from the Northern Territory government. Remember, this announcement was made on 3 August 2012. Its purpose, as the heading of the press release said, was 'Encouraging productivity by investing in Territory bush roads'. The road projects for which the money was made available were: the Roper Highway, for causeways and associated works; the Port Keats Road—to Wadeye, for those who might not be familiar with it—for targeted sealing and flood immunity improvements, which are fundamentally important; the Santa Teresa Way, for upgrading the gravel condition of priority sections—this is an absolutely murderous road that requires significant improvement, and this money must be spent; the Central Arnhem Road, for constructing a new bridge over Rocky Bottom Creek; the Buntine Highway, for targeted strengthening, widening and sealing works; and the Arnhem Link Road, for upgrading the gravel condition of priority sections.

These priorities were agreed, these investments were announced and the money made available. You can imagine my consternation, then, when on 5 March this year I saw a joint media release from the Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Truss, and the Northern Territory Chief Minister, Adam Giles, making this announcement: 'NT's economy to be boosted through upgrades to six remote roads'. That piqued my interest. What did I find? What I found was a re-announcement of the announcement made by Labor and the commitment made by Labor in 2012. They identified $90 million from the Commonwealth, $16 million from the Northern Territory government—just as had been done in 2012—and, oddly, picked exactly the same roads: the Roper Highway, the Port Keats Road, the Arnhem Link Road, the Buntine Highway, the Central Arnhem Road and the Santa Teresa Road.

You can fool some of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all the people all of the time. It seems to me that that is precisely what the government was trying to do. They must think we are mad, that we do not have any memory of investments previously made and announced by a former government. Here we have, writ large, another example of this government making announcements for investments which were already committed by the previous Labor government. What it tells us, of course, is that they don't have any ideas of their own. What it tells us is that they haven't got a damn clue. What it also tells us is they are not prepared to sit down with communities and try to find out what their priorities are. There is no doubt this $90 million with the $16 million from the Northern Territory government are absolutely required, but we do not need a re-announcement by this government in 2014 of an investment made by the Labor government in 2012. We are not fools and I do not think the community will be fooled by these re-announcements.

Yet it is not the only example. What we are seeing from this government—and I am talking about my own electorate of Lingiari here—is a real lack of interest in making sure that communities have their services properly dealt with and their needs recognised and addressed. I will mention just one. In Gove an announcement was made at the end of November last year by Rio Tinto that they would put their refinery at Gove in curtailment—in other words, effectively close it down over a six-month period so that, by July this year, it will be just in care and maintenance; there will be no refining of bauxite. It will mean the loss of 1,200 jobs.

Yet neither this government nor the Northern Territory government has had the wit or wisdom to do a socioeconomic impact assessment of what this closure will mean to those communities and what further investments might need to be made to provide opportunities for jobs and small business in those communities into the future. Not one red cent has been spent by the Abbott government on mediating and mitigating the impacts of this closure on this community.

Understand what this means. For those of you here in the gallery and those who might be listening, we will see a town of 4,000 people drop to 1,200. You can imagine the impact this will have, and is having, on small businesses across the community. We demand that this government take an interest. One thing they could do is stump up $350 million for the Central Arnhem Highway to give these people all-year-round road access, which would provide an incentive for further investment, business and employment opportunities for the region.

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